Alton On The Spot puts you on the spot, with what's hot and what's not in the wonderful world of art and creativity. From the galleries and the museums, the runways and the airwaves, the streets and the stages - I seek the beauty of inspiration, high and low, anywhere and everywhere I can find it.

Monday, May 9, 2016

Straight Shooting! ART Gun on NPR's Texas Standard

The censorship of the piece has garnered more attention than it would have originally.

By Rhonda Fanning & Laura Rice | May 9, 2016 12:00 pm

ART Gun by Alton DuLaney, Texas 2016.

Courtesy Anton DuLaney

The original ARTGun piece has been modified due to university rules.

The school of art annual student exhibition is underway at the University of Houston’s Blaffer Art Museum. An incomplete piece called ‘ARTGun’ is on display in the exhibition.

The art? A .22 revolver, unloaded and displayed in a glass frame with
a red flag with the words “ART” on it sticking out of the barrel. But
the university police and the school’s general council said it could not
be displayed as originally designed. The gun is no longer part of the
art. Instead, it’s now a framed box with a cut out of where the gun was
originally supposed to be
Artist Anton DuLaney, the creator of ‘ARTGun’ says the school
authorities made it clear that the “gun is not allowed on campus and it
is not open to discussion.”

As a native Texan DuLaney says that guns are “omnipotent” in Texas.

“In my work I try to examine pride, power and patriotism and for me the actual gun represented all those things,” DuLaney says.

DuLaney says that while he understands that the school was enforcing
the law, it is still censorship. He says the gun would have been
displayed in a glass frame and the museum has security cameras so it
posed no threat to anyone.

The censorship has generated more interest in the piece than it would have otherwise received.
“They did me a big favor by not allowing it,” DuLaney says.

“I was really (more) interested in my First Amendment rights, than my
second amendment rights on this. They really just reinforced that for
me,” DuLaney says.

The censorship comes at a time when concealed handguns will be allowed on school campuses starting August this year.

“Through the course of this piece I started taking gun safety classes
and went through the whole training for the license to carry program
here in Texas,” DuLaney says. “I have got a broader perspective on this
now than ever before.”